Obama urges ‘strong, unified response’ to aid expulsion
March 10, 2009 (WASHINGTON) — US President Barack Obama told reporters after a meeting with the UN Secretary-General that he urges a strong, unified stand against Sudan’s expulsion last week of 13 humanitarian agencies that had provided the majority of aid in Darfur.
The president noted that “the Khartoum government has kicked out some of the most important nongovernmental organizations that provide direct humanitarian aid to millions of people who’ve been internally displaced in the Sudan. And we have a potential crisis of even greater dimensions that what we already saw.”
“It was from our perspective to send a strong, unified, international message that it is not acceptable to put that many people’s lives at risk; that we need to be able to get those humanitarian organizations back on the ground; and that the United States wants to work as actively as possible with the United Nations to try to resolve the immediate humanitarian crisis and to start putting us on a path for long-term peace and stability in the Sudan.”
In this context, Obama mentioned the role of his UN ambassador, Susan Rice, saying he hoped they could make some progress. However, on Friday the UN Security Council failed to agree on even a non-bonding statement about the expulsion of the aid groups.
He did not elaborate further.
(ST)